Sextus Propertius was a

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

elegiac poet of the Augustan age. He was born around 50–45 BC in Assisium (now

Assisi Assisi (, also ; ; from ; Central Italian: ''Ascesi'') is a town and comune of Italy in the Province of Perugia in the Umbria region, on the western flank of Monte Subasio. It is generally regarded as the birthplace of the Latin poet Prope ...

) and died shortly after 15 BC. Propertius' surviving work comprises four books of '' Elegies'' ('). He was a friend of the poets Gallus and

Virgil Publius Vergilius Maro (; 15 October 70 BC21 September 19 BC), usually called Virgil or Vergil ( ) in English, was an ancient Rome, ancient Roman poet of the Augustan literature (ancient Rome), Augustan period. He composed three of the most fa ...

and, with them, had as his patron

Maecenas Gaius Cilnius Maecenas ( 13 April 68 BC – 8 BC) was a friend and political advisor to Octavian (who later reigned as emperor Augustus). He was also an important patron for the new generation of Augustan poets, including both Horace and Virgil. ...

and, through Maecenas, the emperor

Augustus Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian (), was the founder of the Roman Empire, who reigned as the first Roman emperor from 27 BC until his death in A ...

. Although Propertius was not as renowned in his own time as other Latin elegists, he is today regarded by scholars as a major poet.

Life

Very little information exists about Propertius outside of his own writing. His

praenomen The praenomen (; plural: praenomina) was a first name chosen by the parents of a Ancient Rome, Roman child. It was first bestowed on the ''dies lustricus'' (day of lustration), the eighth day after the birth of a girl, or the ninth day after the ...

"Sextus" is mentioned by

Aelius Donatus Aelius Donatus (; fl. mid-fourth century AD) was a Roman grammarian and teacher of rhetoric. He once taught Jerome, an early Christian Church father who is most known for his translation of the Bible into Latin, known as the Latin Vulgate. N ...

, a few manuscripts list him as "Sextus Propertius", but the rest of his name is unknown. From numerous references in his poetry it is clear he was born and raised in Umbria, of a well-to-do family at or near Asisium (

). His birthplace is generally regarded as modern

, where tourists can view the excavated remains of a house thought to have belonged at least to the poet's family, if not to the poet himself. During Propertius' childhood, his father died and the family lost land as part of a

confiscation Confiscation (from the Latin ''confiscatio'' "to consign to the ''fiscus'', i.e. transfer to the treasury") is a legal form of search and seizure, seizure by a government or other public authority. The word is also used, popularly, of Tampering w ...

, probably the same one which reduced

's estates when Octavian allotted lands to his veterans in 41 BC. Along with cryptic references in

Ovid Publius Ovidius Naso (; 20 March 43 BC – AD 17/18), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Augustan literature (ancient Rome), Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a younger contemporary of Virgil and Horace, with whom he i ...

that imply that he was younger than his contemporary Tibullus, this suggests a birthdate after 55 BC. After his father's death, Propertius' mother set him on course for a public career, indicating his family still had some wealth, while the abundance of obscure mythology present in his poetry indicates he received a good education. Frequent mention of friends like Tullus, the nephew of Lucius Volcatius Tullus, consul in 33 BC, plus the fact that he lived on Rome's Esquiline Hill indicate he moved among the children of the rich and politically connected during the early part of the 20s BC. Propertius published a first book of love elegies around 30 BC, with the character 'Cynthia' as the main theme; the book's complete devotion gave it the natural title ''Cynthia Monobiblos''. The ''Monobiblos'' must have attracted the attention of

, a patron of the arts who took Propertius into his circle of court poets. A second, larger book of elegies was published perhaps a year later, one that includes poems addressed directly to his patron and (as expected) praises for Augustus. The 19th century classics scholar Karl Lachmann argued, based on the unusually large number of poems in this book and Propertius' mention of ''tres libelli'', that the single Book II actually comprises two separate books of poetry conflated in the manuscript tradition, an idea supported by the state of the manuscript tradition of "Book II." An editor of Propertius, Paul Fedeli, accepts this hypothesis, as does G.P. Goold, editor of the Loeb edition. The publication of a third book came sometime after 23 BC. Its content shows the poet beginning to move beyond simple love themes, as some poems (e.g. III.5) use ''Amor'' merely as a starting point for other topics. Book IV, published sometime after 16 BC, displays more of the poet's ambitious agenda, and includes several aetiological poems explaining the origin of various Roman rites and landmarks. Book IV, the last Propertius wrote, has only half the number of poems as Book I. Given the change in direction apparent in his poetry, scholars assume only his death a short time after publication prevented him from further exploration; the collection may in fact have been published posthumously. An elegy of

dated to 2 BC makes it clear that Propertius was dead by this time.

Poetry

Propertius' fame rests on his four books of elegies, totaling around 92 poems (the exact number cannot be known as over the intervening years, scholars have divided and regrouped the poems, creating doubt as to the precise number). All his poems are written using the elegiac couplet, a form in vogue among the Roman social set during the late 1st century BC. Like the work of nearly all the elegists, Propertius' work is dominated by a figure of a single female character, one he refers to throughout his poetry by the name Cynthia. She is named in over half the elegies of the first book and appears indirectly in several others, right from the first word of the first poem in the ''Monobiblos'': Whilst

Apuleius Apuleius ( ), also called Lucius Apuleius Madaurensis (c. 124 – after 170), was a Numidians, Numidian Latin-language prose writer, Platonist philosopher and rhetorician. He was born in the Roman Empire, Roman Numidia (Roman province), province ...

identifies her as a woman named ''Hostia'', and Propertius suggests she is a descendant of the Roman poet Hostius, modern scholarship indicates that the creation of 'Cynthia' is part of a literary convention in Roman love elegy; ''scripta puella'', a fictionalised 'written girl'. Propertius frequently compliments her as ''docta puella'' 'learned girl', and characterises her as a female writer of verse, such as Sulpicia. This literary affair veers wildly between emotional extremes, and as a lover she clearly dominates the life of the poet's voice at least through the publication of the third book: It is difficult to precisely date many of Propertius' poems, but they chronicle the kind of declarations, passions, jealousies, quarrels, and lamentations that were commonplace subjects among the Latin elegists. The last two poems in Book III seem to indicate a final break with the character of Cynthia ( – "It is a shame that my verses have made you famous"). In this last book Cynthia is the subject of only two poems, best regarded as a postscript. The bi-polar complexity of the relationship is amply demonstrated in a poignant, if amusing, poem from the final book. Cynthia's ghost addresses Propertius from beyond the grave with criticism (among other things) that her funeral was not lavish enough, yet the longing of the poet remains in the final line ''.'' – "Her shade then slipped away from my embrace." Book IV strongly indicates that Propertius was planning a new direction for his poetry. The book includes several aetiological poems which, in reviewing the mythological origins of Rome and its landmarks, can also be read as critical—even vaguely subversive—of

and his agenda for the new Rome. The position is currently a subject of debate among modern classicists. The final poem is a touching address by the recently deceased Cornelia consoling her husband Lucius Aemilius Lepidus Paullus and their three children. Although the poem (given Cornelia's connection to Augustus' family) was most likely an imperial commission, its dignity, nobility, and pathos have led critics to call it the "queen of the elegies", and it is commonly considered the best in the collection. Propertius' style is marked by seemingly abrupt transitions (in the manner of Latin neoteric poetry) and a high and imaginative allusion, often to the more obscure passages of Greek and Roman myth and legend. His idiosyncratic use of language, together with the corrupted state of the text, have made his elegies a challenge to edit; among the more famous names who have offered criticism of and emendations to the text have been the classicist John Percival Postgate and the English classicist and poet A. E. Housman.

Textual problems

The text contains many syntactic, organizational and logical problems as it has survived. Some of these are no doubt exacerbated by Propertius' bold and occasionally unconventional use of Latin. Others have led scholars to alter and sometimes rearrange the text as preserved in the manuscripts. A total of 146 Propertius manuscripts survive, the oldest of which dates from the 12th century. However, some of the poems in these manuscripts appear disjointed, such as I.8, which begins as a plea for Cynthia to abandon a planned sea voyage, then closes with sudden joy that the voyage has been called off. This poem has therefore been split by most scholars into a I.8a (comprising the first 26 lines) and I.8b (lines 27–46). More complicated organizational problems are presented by poems like II.26, a confusing piece in which Propertius first (1) dreams of Cynthia being shipwrecked, and then (2) praises Cynthia's faithfulness. Following this, he (3) declares that she plans to sail and he will come along, (4) shifts to the couple together on the shore, and then (5) quickly has them back on board ship, ready to face the potential dangers of the sea. The images seem to conflict logically and chronologically, and have led different commentators to rearrange the lines or assume some '' lacunae'' in the text. More modern critics have pointed out that all the proposed rearrangements assume Propertius' original poetry adhered strictly to the classical literary principles as set down by

Aristotle Aristotle (; 384–322 BC) was an Ancient Greek philosophy, Ancient Greek philosopher and polymath. His writings cover a broad range of subjects spanning the natural sciences, philosophy, linguistics, economics, politics, psychology, a ...

, and so the apparent jumble is a result of manuscript corruptions. Another possibility is that Propertius was deliberately presenting disjointed images in violation of principles such as the Classical Unities, a theory which argues for different unifying structures in Propertius' elegies. This interpretation also implies that Propertius' style represented a mild reaction against the orthodoxy of classical literary theory. However, although these theories may have some bearing on issues of continuity in the other three surviving books of Propertius, modern philological scholarship tends toward a consensus that the extant text "Book II" in fact represents the conflated remains of what were originally two books of poems. Recent editors of Propertius—notably Paulo Fedeli (Teubner 1984; compare G.P. Gould's 1990 revision of the Loeb text)—reflect these conclusions in their texts for "Book II", which show it as such a conflation of two books (the second and third of an original five), with some passages lost, parts of poems and whole poems combined, and possible shuffling of fragments. This case is well supported by the texts themselves and fits testimonial evidence about Propertius's original publication of his work: first the "Monobiblos" (our "Book I"), then a collection of three books (our "Book II" and Book III—the three-book elegiac format imitated by Ovid's Amores) and lastly our Book IV, very likely posthumously.

Influence

Propertius himself says he was popular and even scandalous in his own day.

Horace Quintus Horatius Flaccus (; 8 December 65 BC – 27 November 8 BC), Suetonius, Life of Horace commonly known in the English-speaking world as Horace (), was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus (also known as Octavian). Th ...

, however, says that he would have to "endure much" and "stop up his ears" if he had to listen to "

Callimachus Callimachus (; ; ) was an ancient Greek poet, scholar, and librarian who was active in Alexandria during the 3rd century BC. A representative of Ancient Greek literature of the Hellenistic period, he wrote over 800 literary works, most of which ...

... to please the sensitive stock of poets"; Postgate and others see this as a veiled attack on Propertius, who considered himself the Roman heir to Callimachus. This judgement also seems to be upheld by

Quintilian Marcus Fabius Quintilianus (; 35 – 100 AD) was a Roman educator and rhetorician born in Hispania, widely referred to in medieval schools of rhetoric and in Renaissance writing. In English translation, he is usually referred to as Quin ...

, who ranks the elegies of Tibullus higher and, while accepting that others preferred Propertius, is himself somewhat dismissive of the poet. However, Propertius' popularity is attested by the presence of his verses in the graffiti preserved at

Pompeii Pompeii ( ; ) was a city in what is now the municipality of Pompei, near Naples, in the Campania region of Italy. Along with Herculaneum, Stabiae, and Villa Boscoreale, many surrounding villas, the city was buried under of volcanic ash and p ...

; while

, for example, drew on him repeatedly for poetic themes, more than on Tibullus. Propertius fell into obscurity in the Middle Ages. He and Cynthia are mentioned, along with other Roman poets and their female characters, in the 12th-century goliardic poem ''Metamorphosis Goliae episcopi'', but he was truly rediscovered during the Italian Renaissance along with the other elegists.

Petrarch Francis Petrarch (; 20 July 1304 – 19 July 1374; ; modern ), born Francesco di Petracco, was a scholar from Arezzo and poet of the early Italian Renaissance, as well as one of the earliest Renaissance humanism, humanists. Petrarch's redis ...

's love sonnets certainly show the influence of his writing, and Aeneas Silvius (the future Pope Pius II) titled a collection of his youthful elegies "Cinthia". There are also a set of "Propertian Elegies" attributed to the English writer

Ben Jonson Benjamin Jonson ( 11 June 1572 – ) was an English playwright, poet and actor. Jonson's artistry exerted a lasting influence on English poetry and stage comedy. He popularised the comedy of humours; he is best known for the satire, satirical ...

, though the authorship of these is disputed.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Johann Wolfgang (von) Goethe (28 August 1749 – 22 March 1832) was a German polymath who is widely regarded as the most influential writer in the German language. His work has had a wide-ranging influence on Western literature, literary, Polit ...

's 1795 collection of "Elegies" also shows some familiarity with Propertius' poetry. Propertius is the lyrical protagonist of Joseph Brodsky's poem "Anno Domini" (1968), originally written in Russian. His relationship with Cynthia is also addressed in Robert Lowell's poem, "The Ghost. After Sextus Propertius", which is a free translation of Propertius' Elegy IV 7. Elena Shvarts wrote a cycle of poems as if they were the works of Propertius' love, Cynthia. She explains Cynthia's 'poems have not survived, nevertheless I have tried to translate them into Russian'.

Modern assessment

In the 20th century

Ezra Pound Ezra Weston Loomis Pound (30 October 1885 – 1 November 1972) was an List of poets from the United States, American poet and critic, a major figure in the early modernist poetry movement, and a Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Ita ...

's poem "Homage to Sextus Propertius" cast Propertius as something of a satirist and political dissident, and his translation/interpretation of the elegies presented them as ancient examples of Pound's own

Imagist Imagism was a movement in early-20th-century poetry that favored precision of imagery and clear, sharp language. It is considered to be the first organized literary modernism, modernist literary movement in the English language. Imagism has bee ...

theory of art. Pound identified in Propertius an example of what he called (in "How to Read") 'logopoeia', "the dance of the intellect among words." Gilbert Highet, in ''Poets in a Landscape'', attributed this to Propertius' use of mythic allusions and circumlocution, which Pound mimics to more comic effect in his ''Homage''. The imagist interpretation, the poet's tendency to sustain an interior monologue, and the deeply personal nature of his poetry have made Propertius a favorite in the modern age. In 1906 J. S. Phillimore presented a prose translation of Propertius, published by

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the publishing house of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world. Its first book was printed in Oxford in 1478, with the Press officially granted the legal right to print books ...

. Three modern English translations of his work have appeared since 2000,Slavitt's translation appeared in 2002, Katz's 2004 translation was a winner of the 2005 National Translation Award, American Literary Translators Association. and the playwright Tom Stoppard suggests in his best-known work '' The Invention of Love'' that the poet was responsible for much of what the West regards today as "romantic love". The most recent translation appeared in September 2018 from Carcanet Press, and was a Poetry Book Society Autumn Recommended Translation. The collection, entitled ''Poems'', is edited by Patrick Worsnip with a foreword by Peter Heslin.

Latin editions

* Karl Lachmann, Leipzig 1816 * Emil Baehrens, Bibliotheca Teubneriana, 1880 * John Percival Postgate, Cambridge, 1894 *john S. Phillimore, Oxford 1901 * E.A. Barber, Oxford Classical Text, 1953 (2nd ed., 1960) * W.A. Camps, Book 1, Cambridge, 1961 * L. Richardson, Jr., Lawrence, Okla., 1977 * Rudolf Hanslik, Bibliotheca Teubneriana, 1979 * Paolo Fedeli, Bibliotheca Teubneriana, 1984 * Paolo Fedeli, Book 3, Bari, 1985 * G.P. Goold,

Loeb Classical Library The Loeb Classical Library (LCL; named after James Loeb; , ) is a monographic series of books originally published by Heinemann and since 1934 by Harvard University Press. It has bilingual editions of ancient Greek and Latin literature, ...

, 1990 * Robert J. Baker, Book 1, Warminster, 2000 * Paolo Fedeli, Book 2, Cambridge, 2005 * Giancarlo Giardina, Rome, 2005 * Simone Viarre, Collection Budé, 2005 * Gregory Hutchinson, Book 4, Cambridge, 2006 * S. J. Heyworth, Oxford Classical Text, 2007

Notes

References

* Propertius, ''The Poems'' (Oxford World's Classics) - see especially Lyne's introduction * David Slavitt, ''Propertius in Love: The Elegies'' University of Cal. Press (2002) * Vincent Katz, ''The Complete Elegies of Sextus Propertius'' Princeton University Press (2004) * D.Feeney, ''Literature and Religion at Rome: Cultures, Contexts, and Beliefs'' * M.Beard, J. North & S.Price, ''Religions of Rome'' * J.North, 'Religion and Politics: from Republic to Principate' in Journal of Roman Studies 76 * J.Hallett, 'Queens, princeps and women of the Augustan elite: Propertius' Cornelia elegy and the Res Gestae Divi Augusti' in R. Winkes (ed.) 'The Age of Augustus' * Max Turiel, ''Propertivs: Algunas Elegías y Variaciones'', Spanish edition, ( Ediciones RIE, 2008 ), . * Syndikus, H. P. 2010. ''Die Elegien des Properz: Eine Interpretation.'' Darmstadt: WBG, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. * Robert Karacsony, ''Properzens Vertumnus-Elegie (4,2) und das Dichtungsprogramm des vierten Buches. Ein intertextueller Kommentar.'' Hamburger Studien zu Gesellschaften und Kulturen der Vormoderne. Band 3. 2018.

External links

* * * * *
The ''Elegies'' of Propertius
at The Latin Library
English translations of Propertius with introductory essay and notes by Jon Corelis

* ttps://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text.jsp?doc=Prop.+1.1&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.02.0067 Propertius at the Perseus Project
Propertius and cacozelia latens
{{DEFAULTSORT:Propertius 1st-century BC writers in Latin 1st-century BC Roman poets 1st-century BC births 50s BC deaths 10s BC deaths Golden Age Latin writers Elegiac poets People from Assisi